After purchasing your first property for investment, you must be thinking that you are packed to be a successful investor and work would stop here. Guess again. Buying an investment property such as Avalon condo is just the start of the investing journey. Now, as a landlord, you will have more responsibilities to juggle such as managing your rental property, paying taxes, and sourcing for the right tenant. It is not an easy job and would require a long term management strategy to ensure continuous investment performance. Securing tenant is the main concern of all landlord, as tenant are the main contributor of your rental income. Thus, it is important to choose your tenant wisely. Here are a list of tenant to beware of when you are trying to rent out your property.

1. Tenant with bad reputation and eviction history

A background check and some detective work is needed on your potential tenants. Some small talks, details of their jobs, previous rental history are important information you should get before making any decision in renting out the property. Never rent out your property to a tenant who was evicted by their previous landlord. Some will explain as if the fault were not theirs and it was the landlord’s grudge against them. Let’s be rational, landlords will not hold any grudges towards the tenant except for money matters. Eviction notices are usually due to payment delay or vandalism of the property.

2. Individuals who are unemployed or frequent change of jobs

The second most important factor to check is their job history. Landlords have rights to obtain these kind of information to gauge the credibility and reliability of potential tenant. Stable, high income does not correlate with on-time payment and less troublesome, but it may still be an indicator to consider the tenants credibility. A person with no stable income may raise some red flags as they may delay their rental payments or avoid making them. It is a better bet to rent out your property to a tenant with stable job and a secure income.

3. Bad credit history

A tenant with poor credit history may have the tendency to delay payment. People with good credit history are less likely to pay rental at the end of the month. These people may be frequent movers, from one rental property to another. The reason behind may not be simple as, moving due to work or spending their savings on buying an investment property instead of a home.

4. Criminal records

A responsible landlord will make sure that your tenants and neighbors are safe. A check on criminal record could be a cautious step taken to prevent any crime opportunity to arise within your neighborhood or apartment.

5. Unhygienic tenant

Some giveaways may be greasy hair, shoes with holes in the soles, off-white shorts with a button or two missing, and finger nails in which you could grow a sack of spuds.

If you let to the Filthy family, expect your property to look equally grotty within weeks. The kids will use your walls as artist easels. Kitchen floors will be covered in grease and oil. Cooking waste and grease will stained the table tops, sofa with food stains, clogged toilet and there may be even pet poo.

The last advice is do no rush to secure your tenant. Inexperienced landlords often rush to get a tenant. They use free tenant search sites to reduce their costs. They accept the first tenant willing to pay the asking rent, in a desperate bid to avoid costly void periods. Our experience is that acting hastily can be very costly in the long run.